CROSS-LEAVED HEATH 



101 



game. The leaves are in whorls of 4, and are lance-shaped, linear, 

 spreading, blunt, the old leaves hairless, the young leaves fringed 

 with hairs, downy above and on the midrib below, the margins rolled 

 back to the midrib an adaptation to drought. 



The flowers are in a sort of terminal umbel, drooping, rose-coloured, 

 darker above, the parts in fours. The sepals are linear, oblong-lance- 

 shaped, downy. The corolla is regular, egg-shaped, the mouth scarcely 

 oblique. The flower-stalks are short, with bracteoles in the middle. 



CROSS-LEAVED HEATH (Erica Tetralix, L.) 



J. H. Crabtree 



The anthers are spurred, with awl-like awns, and are included. The 

 ovary is downy, with hairs tipped with glands. 



The height of this Heath is about i ft. It flowers in June up till 

 August. It is an evergreen shrub, propagated by cuttings, and worth 

 cultivating. 



The flower is bell-like in form and drooping, so that honey and 

 pollen are amply protected from rain. The mouth of the clapper is 

 2 mm. wide, nearly taken up by the long style and stigma, and the 

 tube is contracted in the middle, and i mm. wide. A dark glandular 

 honey-ring surrounds the base of the ovary, and the style stands in the 

 centre and fills up the mouth, bearing a black, moist, sticky stigma 

 which is slightly exserted. An insect clinging to the flower touches 

 it and is covered with a sticky secretion. 



